This reminds me of a certain argument we had about… 15 years ago? :”D I will say that this time, things are different, mostly in that the -need- of the collector to own something to hold, feel and “bag” is higher than that of a music listener to own a physical album. BUT… wouldn’t it be healthier for the industry to move away from courting the collector? And could you imagine how cool it would be to read comics from other countries this way and not have to wait for some publisher to pony up huge amounts of cash just to try and get something published here? The one thing this has going against it that I can see is the same thing music has going against it now; there are comics for free everywhere you look on the web already. Is the stigma of web content = free too heavily embossed on the public awareness for any kind of pricing to work? What do you think, Scott?

I’ve read quite a few digital comics and I really like them. The colour is richer on-screen for one thing! And for another thing, of the one or two scanned comics from the seventies I’ve seen it’s been a real nostalgic treat to see them as I remember them (if only they could duplicate the smell). The only thing I find tricky is how much my eyes sting. I was hoping the Kindle et al would solve this, but they’ve got a long way to go before they get the colour issue sorted out and the display contrast isn’t so hot. Perhaps the new Pixel-Qi screens will solve this. I do hope so. The demos on YouTube look promising.

I think Mike L above hits many of the boons of digital distribution, most notably (to my mind) the ability to discover work from around the globe that publishers might not be rushing to get into brick-and-mortar stores. As for the stigma of web content having to be free, I think iTunes has successfully shown that there remain plenty of folks who will fork over their cash, provided the price is right. And at 99 cents an issue, the price does indeed seem right, especially when compared to 3.99 being charged these days for 22 pages printed on paper. However, when digital distribution does finally catch on, which I personally feel it’s bound to, I do wonder/worry what will become of my friendly neighborhood comic shop.

Can’t say whether this needs to happen or whether it was just inevitably going to happen, or maybe both. Whatever I can’t honestly see this being good for our local comic shops.
I’ll probably give it a shot though. But i’m still quite worried comic stores will begin to go the way of the record store.